1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a process and apparatus for treating hazardous waste water, and more particularly to a mobile apparatus for the treatment of hazardous waste waters as established by the EPA Toxicity Characteristic Teaching Procedures Rules DOO4-D043 (Sep. 1, 1990) and F001 to F005 to form a treated or product water which is non-toxic and reusable or recyclable (zero discharge of waste water).
2. Background of the Invention
With increasing pressure of pollution control laws, diminishing potable drinking water resources, and in escalating water and sewer cost, U.S. and overseas industries are considering the alternative of industrial process waste water reclamation and reuse as a viable solution to such problems. On-site commercial and industrial waste water reclamation and reuse is becoming a basic cost of manufacturing and a means to reduce water, sewer, chemicals and energy costs for process, cooling, washing, rinsing and cleaning water uses.
Hazardous and solid waste regulations have greatly reduced the amount of waste a manufacturing business can generate. Federal regulatory bodies governing the management of hazardous waste define hazardous waste as any solid waste which has the potential to harm human life or the environment. Under the passage of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976, large quantity generators are defined as those generating less than 1000 kg per month of hazardous waste.
The Hazardous and Solid Waste Amendment of 1984 has significantly changed such systems by defining the LQG as one generating 1000 kg (approximately 2200 lbs. or 270.5 gallons) per month of such waste. These changes have resulted in greatly increasing the number of regulated generators and the number of regulated waste as well as increasing the pressure on local bodies to ensure that hazardous waste is not being introduced into the municipal water stream.
Among the many large quantity generators affected by such regulations are oil companies, such as refiners and distribution terminals, electronic manufacturing companies, chemical companies, industrial dry cleaning and laundry establishments, etc. Numerous contaminants are generated by the automobile service center in everyday operation, such as in the cleaning and repairing of engine parts. Included among these contaminants are solvents, sediment, used oil, organic compositions, such as antifreeze and a wide variety of heavy metals including significant quantities of copper, zinc, mercury, chromium and lead. In the past, such wastes have been disposed in municipal sewerage systems, septic tanks and underground storage tanks. Today's methods are very costly in that special disposal is necessary and that such municipal systems have high pretreatment requirements prior to disposal as a commercial/industrial user.
The EPA Toxicity Characteristic Teaching Procedures Rules D004-D043 (Sep. 1, 1990) set forth the list of toxic wastes and F wastes that are treatable to produce a treated or product water essentially non-toxic and reusable or recyclable (0 discharge of waste water).
Generally, plants are being built with consideration for dedicated on-site facilities for treating such waste waters; however, there is a need for a portable assembly for treating any and all such waste waters which may be facilely moved from site to site to effectively treat any and all such process waste waters thereby obviating dedicated on-site facilities thereby substantially reducing capital investments while accomplishing the desired requirements of treating toxic waste to render the resulting product water recyclable or reusable.
In the copending U.S. application, Ser. No. 08/332,660, there is disclosed a portable assembly for treating hazardous waste water having a plurality of paired filter units having filter mediums and operated at high filter rates to minimize solids build up wherein solids are caused to be smashed and broken by shear forces and wherein chemicals are sequentially added to facilitate solids reduction, to oxidize organic compounds and to precipitate dissolved solids and wherein the process stream is subjected to ultraviolet light to reduce organic loading and downstream ultra filtration units to further reduce solids followed by reverse osmosis and/or ionization treatment.
While the process and apparatus of the aforementioned patent application is effected for treating hazardous waste water, there is the need to provide a more simplistic process and apparatus for treating hazardous waste water for immediate water reuse.